Chaput: More Big Families, Please

Archbishop of Philadelphia Charles Chaput (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

The huge Catholic family is something of a cliché — and these days something of a thing of the past: A reported 98 percent of American Catholic women use birth control, after all, despite church doctrines against doing so.

Philadelphia Archbishop Charles Chaput, in Rome for a controversial synod of bishops advising the church on how it should approach marriage and family issues in the future, misses the old days. He gave an interview to the French Catholic magazine Famille Chretienne, reprinted at CatholicPhilly.com, lamenting tiny, two-children families.

“I’ve been surprised by how little the synod text says about the joys of having children, and especially the beauty and heroic witness of large families. Children are the future. They’re a gift from God. They renew the world,” Chaput told the magazine.

“It’s sad to see so many couples today cheat themselves out of more love and more joy by having only two children. Life is meant to be an adventure, to be abundant – not to be strangled by worry. God provides. He never abandons hearts that are generous. I have tremendous esteem for large families. I wish we had many more of them. They’re the hope of the Church.”

The full interview can be read here.